Jamestown, Virginia 57not unknown. In just one example, Elizabeth Kay, a mulatto
woman from Northumberland County, successfully sued
for her freedom in 1656 because her father had been white.
Aft erward, Kay married William Greensted, the white attor-
ney who had assisted her in the court case. Slaves sometimes
also created close bonds with their owners. In the 1660s, a
white York County man freed his slave in his will, then des-
ignated the newly freed man both the inheritor of his estate
and the guardian of a young white girl in his care.
What, then, caused this transformation from the ra-
cially open society of the 17th century to the virulently rac-
ist one that developed in the 18th? Political, economic, and
demographic changes in Virginia from about 1660–1700
laid the foundation for this change. First, Virginia planters
continued to use laborers to work in their tobacco fi elds,
but by the 1660s, the number of English people willing to
become indentured servants in Virginia had dropped con-
siderably. Th is occurred because the birth rate in England
had dropped, thereby raising the wages the poor could re-
ceive at home. Also, those Englishmen who still desired
to travel to America had other more appealing choices by
end of the century, such as Pennsylvania and South Caro-
lina. By 1700, almost no one willingly came to Virginia as
a servant. Planters coped with their labor needs by buying
slaves instead. Planters were already familiar with the idea
of slavery because of the small number of slaves who had
been in the colony for decades. Although slaves were con-
siderably more expensive than indentured servants, the
rising life expectancies that benefi ted all Virginians in the
second half of the 17th century also made slave ownership
more aff ordable. If a slave cost twice as much as a servant
with a seven-year term, but they both were likely to live
only fi ve years, the lower-priced servant was the obvious
choice. But if, with the rise in life expectancy, each person
was likely to live another 10 or 15 years, the purchase of
a slave made more sense, and eventually became the bet-
ter bargain. Th is proved especially true when slave women
bore children, who replenished their master’s labor supply
at little additional cost.
Th ese factors explain why slaves replaced indentured
servants, but not the reasons for the growing racial dis-
crimination among whites in Virginia. One reason is re-
lated to demography; as the demand for slaves grew, ships
began carrying cargoes of slaves directly from Africa to
Virginia for the fi rst time beginning in the 1680s. Th ese
Africans were oft en newly enslaved, and unfamiliar withfavor—another sign that Johnson’s white peers did not hold
his race against him.
Even blacks who were destined to remain slaves expe-
rienced greater opportunity and less racial discrimination
than would blacks in the 18th and 19th centuries. Slaves
usually lived and worked alongside whites, including inden-
tured servants and their owners, who were rarely wealthy
enough to leave the fi elds. Likewise, owners rarely spent
the eff ort to build a separate slave “quarter” for one or two
slaves. Th us, slaves oft en partook of the same food, shelter,
and working conditions as the whites around them. Th e only
thing that diff erentiated them from other servants was the
length of their servitude. Living in close proximity with one
another, blacks oft en formed friendships and romantic at-
tachments with whites, especially indentured servants. Race
was less important to white indentured servants than their
shared situation as poorly treated laborers. Slaves and in-
dentured servants sometimes ran away together, indicating
a degree of camaraderie and trust in one another. Interracial
sexual unions were common, and interracial marriage was
A Dutch man-of-war brought the fi rst African captives to
Jamestown in 1619. (Library of Congress)